diff --git a/drivers/tty/serial/serial_core.c b/drivers/tty/serial/serial_core.c
index 55965d5b8143..69d00008f7a3 100644
--- a/drivers/tty/serial/serial_core.c
+++ b/drivers/tty/serial/serial_core.c
@@ -1529,15 +1529,6 @@ static int uart_open(struct tty_struct *tty, struct file *filp)
 	BUG_ON(!tty_locked());
 	pr_debug("uart_open(%d) called\n", line);
 
-	/*
-	 * tty->driver->num won't change, so we won't fail here with
-	 * tty->driver_data set to something non-NULL (and therefore
-	 * we won't get caught by uart_close()).
-	 */
-	retval = -ENODEV;
-	if (line >= tty->driver->num)
-		goto fail;
-
 	/*
 	 * We take the semaphore inside uart_get to guarantee that we won't
 	 * be re-entered while allocating the state structure, or while we