diff --git a/src/operator/spatial_transformer-inl.h b/src/operator/spatial_transformer-inl.h
index 301c55c93719..3e863d877b08 100644
--- a/src/operator/spatial_transformer-inl.h
+++ b/src/operator/spatial_transformer-inl.h
@@ -54,6 +54,7 @@ struct SpatialTransformerParam : public dmlc::Parameter<SpatialTransformerParam>
   TShape target_shape;
   int transform_type;
   int sampler_type;
+  dmlc::optional<bool> cudnn_off;
   DMLC_DECLARE_PARAMETER(SpatialTransformerParam) {
     int shape[] = {0, 0};
     DMLC_DECLARE_FIELD(target_shape).set_default(TShape(shape, shape + 2))
@@ -62,6 +63,8 @@ struct SpatialTransformerParam : public dmlc::Parameter<SpatialTransformerParam>
         .describe("transformation type");
     DMLC_DECLARE_FIELD(sampler_type).add_enum("bilinear", st::kBilinear)
         .describe("sampling type");
+    DMLC_DECLARE_FIELD(cudnn_off).set_default(dmlc::optional<bool>())
+        .describe("whether to turn cudnn off");
   }
 };
 
@@ -101,11 +104,11 @@ class SpatialTransformerOp : public Operator {
     }
     Copy(grid_dst, workspace, grid_dst.stream_);
     for (index_t batch = 0; batch < data.size(0); batch++) {
-        if (param_.transform_type == st::kAffine) {
-          // Legacy approach shown here for comparison:
-          //    grid_src[batch] = dot(loc[batch], grid_dst);
-          linalg_gemm(loc[batch], grid_dst, grid_src[batch], false, false, s);
-        }
+      if (param_.transform_type == st::kAffine) {
+        // Legacy approach shown here for comparison:
+        //    grid_src[batch] = dot(loc[batch], grid_dst);
+        linalg_gemm(loc[batch], grid_dst, grid_src[batch], false, false, s);
+      }
     }
     if (param_.sampler_type == st::kBilinear) {
       BilinearSamplingForward(out, data, grid_src);
@@ -136,11 +139,11 @@ class SpatialTransformerOp : public Operator {
       BilinearSamplingBackward(gdata, grid_src, grad, data);
     }
     for (index_t batch = 0; batch < data.size(0); batch++) {
-        if (param_.transform_type == st::kAffine) {
-          // Legacy approach shown here for comparison:
-          //   gloc[batch] = dot(grid_src[batch], grid_dst.T());
-          linalg_gemm(grid_src[batch], grid_dst, gloc[batch], false, true, s);
-        }
+      if (param_.transform_type == st::kAffine) {
+        // Legacy approach shown here for comparison:
+        //   gloc[batch] = dot(grid_src[batch], grid_dst.T());
+        linalg_gemm(grid_src[batch], grid_dst, gloc[batch], false, true, s);
+      }
     }
   }
 
diff --git a/src/operator/spatial_transformer.cu b/src/operator/spatial_transformer.cu
index f1d69f7618e6..33dbe3e7c069 100644
--- a/src/operator/spatial_transformer.cu
+++ b/src/operator/spatial_transformer.cu
@@ -121,6 +121,7 @@ __global__ void BilinearSamplingBackwardKernel(const int i_c, const int i_h,
       if (between(top_left_x, 0, i_w-1) && between(top_left_y+1, 0, i_h-1)) {
         atomicAdd((g_input + data_index + i_w),
                   *(grad + grad_index) * (1.0 - top_left_y_w) * top_left_x_w);
+        bottom_left_v = *(data + data_index + i_w);
       }
       if (between(top_left_x+1, 0, i_w-1) && between(top_left_y+1, 0, i_h-1)) {
         atomicAdd((g_input + data_index + i_w + 1),
@@ -194,7 +195,11 @@ Operator* CreateOp<gpu>(SpatialTransformerParam param, int dtype) {
   Operator *op = NULL;
 #if MXNET_USE_CUDNN == 1 && CUDNN_MAJOR >= 5
   MSHADOW_REAL_TYPE_SWITCH(dtype, DType, {
-    op = new CuDNNSpatialTransformerOp<DType>(param);
+    if (param.cudnn_off.has_value() && param.cudnn_off.value()) {
+      op = new SpatialTransformerOp<gpu, DType>(param);
+    } else {
+      op = new CuDNNSpatialTransformerOp<DType>(param);
+    }
   })
 #else
   MSHADOW_REAL_TYPE_SWITCH(dtype, DType, {
diff --git a/tests/python/gpu/test_operator_gpu.py b/tests/python/gpu/test_operator_gpu.py
index d201a2e09c6d..dd7ec985c7c8 100644
--- a/tests/python/gpu/test_operator_gpu.py
+++ b/tests/python/gpu/test_operator_gpu.py
@@ -749,7 +749,6 @@ def test_grid_generator_with_type():
     check_consistency(sym, ctx_list, grad_req="add")
 
 
-@unittest.skip("test fails intermittently. temporarily disabled till it gets fixed.  https://github.com/apache/incubator-mxnet/issues/11839")
 @with_seed()
 def test_spatial_transformer_with_type():
     data = mx.sym.Variable('data')
@@ -758,11 +757,15 @@ def test_spatial_transformer_with_type():
     loc = mx.sym.Activation(data=loc, act_type='relu')
     loc = mx.sym.FullyConnected(data=loc, num_hidden=6)
     sym = mx.sym.SpatialTransformer(data=data, loc=loc, target_shape=(10, 10),
-                                    transform_type="affine", sampler_type="bilinear")
+                                    transform_type="affine", sampler_type="bilinear", cudnn_off=True)
     ctx_list = [{'ctx': mx.gpu(0), 'data': (1, 5, 10, 10), 'type_dict': {'data': np.float64}},
                 {'ctx': mx.cpu(0), 'data': (1, 5, 10, 10), 'type_dict': {'data': np.float64}}]
     check_consistency(sym, ctx_list)
     check_consistency(sym, ctx_list, grad_req="add")
+    sym = mx.sym.SpatialTransformer(data=data, loc=loc, target_shape=(10, 10),
+                                    transform_type="affine", sampler_type="bilinear", cudnn_off=False)
+    check_consistency(sym, ctx_list)
+    check_consistency(sym, ctx_list, grad_req="add")
 
 
 @with_seed()