diff --git a/drivers/rtc/rtc-dev.c b/drivers/rtc/rtc-dev.c
index 0a870b7..ae3bd4d 100644
--- a/drivers/rtc/rtc-dev.c
+++ b/drivers/rtc/rtc-dev.c
@@ -221,7 +221,7 @@
 
 	err = mutex_lock_interruptible(&rtc->ops_lock);
 	if (err)
-		return -EBUSY;
+		return err;
 
 	/* check that the calling task has appropriate permissions
 	 * for certain ioctls. doing this check here is useful