diff --git a/external/kafka/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/streaming/kafka/DirectKafkaInputDStream.scala b/external/kafka/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/streaming/kafka/DirectKafkaInputDStream.scala
index cbafb6ad78c97..6b44eea998ec2 100644
--- a/external/kafka/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/streaming/kafka/DirectKafkaInputDStream.scala
+++ b/external/kafka/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/streaming/kafka/DirectKafkaInputDStream.scala
@@ -62,8 +62,7 @@ class DirectKafkaInputDStream[
     val fromOffsets: Map[TopicAndPartition, Long],
     messageHandler: MessageAndMetadata[K, V] => R
 ) extends InputDStream[R](ssc_) with Logging {
-
-  private val maxRetries = context.sparkContext.getConf.getInt(
+  val maxRetries = context.sparkContext.getConf.getInt(
     "spark.streaming.kafka.maxRetries", 1)
 
   protected override val customScopeName: Option[String] = Some(s"kafka direct stream [$id]")