diff --git a/hudi-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hudi/exception/ExceptionUtil.java b/hudi-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hudi/exception/ExceptionUtil.java
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000..a0550ba9eaf60
--- /dev/null
+++ b/hudi-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hudi/exception/ExceptionUtil.java
@@ -0,0 +1,42 @@
+/*
+ * Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one
+ * or more contributor license agreements.  See the NOTICE file
+ * distributed with this work for additional information
+ * regarding copyright ownership.  The ASF licenses this file
+ * to you under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the
+ * "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance
+ * with the License.  You may obtain a copy of the License at
+ *
+ *      http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+ *
+ * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+ * distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+ * WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+ * See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+ * limitations under the License.
+ */
+
+package org.apache.hudi.exception;
+
+import javax.annotation.Nonnull;
+
+/**
+ * Class collecting common utilities helping in handling {@link Exception}s
+ */
+public final class ExceptionUtil {
+  private ExceptionUtil() {}
+
+  /**
+   * Fetches inner-most cause of the provided {@link Throwable}
+   */
+  @Nonnull
+  public static Throwable getRootCause(@Nonnull Throwable t) {
+    Throwable cause = t;
+    while (cause.getCause() != null) {
+      cause = cause.getCause();
+    }
+
+    return cause;
+  }
+
+}
diff --git a/hudi-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hudi/keygen/constant/KeyGeneratorOptions.java b/hudi-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hudi/keygen/constant/KeyGeneratorOptions.java
index 3e369a54b9703..d8535a21450cc 100644
--- a/hudi-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hudi/keygen/constant/KeyGeneratorOptions.java
+++ b/hudi-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hudi/keygen/constant/KeyGeneratorOptions.java
@@ -52,7 +52,7 @@ public class KeyGeneratorOptions extends HoodieConfig {
 
   public static final ConfigProperty<String> PARTITIONPATH_FIELD_NAME = ConfigProperty
       .key("hoodie.datasource.write.partitionpath.field")
-      .defaultValue("partitionpath")
+      .noDefaultValue()
       .withDocumentation("Partition path field. Value to be used at the partitionPath component of HoodieKey. "
           + "Actual value ontained by invoking .toString()");
 
diff --git a/hudi-spark-datasource/hudi-spark-common/src/main/scala/org/apache/hudi/DataSourceOptions.scala b/hudi-spark-datasource/hudi-spark-common/src/main/scala/org/apache/hudi/DataSourceOptions.scala
index c1101f3b2011c..51bcd882d5d8a 100644
--- a/hudi-spark-datasource/hudi-spark-common/src/main/scala/org/apache/hudi/DataSourceOptions.scala
+++ b/hudi-spark-datasource/hudi-spark-common/src/main/scala/org/apache/hudi/DataSourceOptions.scala
@@ -676,7 +676,7 @@ object DataSourceWriteOptions {
   val PARTITIONPATH_FIELD_OPT_KEY = KeyGeneratorOptions.PARTITIONPATH_FIELD_NAME.key()
   /** @deprecated Use {@link PARTITIONPATH_FIELD} and its methods instead */
   @Deprecated
-  val DEFAULT_PARTITIONPATH_FIELD_OPT_VAL = PARTITIONPATH_FIELD.defaultValue()
+  val DEFAULT_PARTITIONPATH_FIELD_OPT_VAL = null
 
   /** @deprecated Use {@link TABLE_NAME} and its methods instead */
   @Deprecated
diff --git a/hudi-spark-datasource/hudi-spark/src/main/scala/org/apache/hudi/HoodieWriterUtils.scala b/hudi-spark-datasource/hudi-spark/src/main/scala/org/apache/hudi/HoodieWriterUtils.scala
index 52d4a528897f8..282de54f65259 100644
--- a/hudi-spark-datasource/hudi-spark/src/main/scala/org/apache/hudi/HoodieWriterUtils.scala
+++ b/hudi-spark-datasource/hudi-spark/src/main/scala/org/apache/hudi/HoodieWriterUtils.scala
@@ -56,7 +56,6 @@ object HoodieWriterUtils {
     hoodieConfig.setDefaultValue(PRECOMBINE_FIELD)
     hoodieConfig.setDefaultValue(PAYLOAD_CLASS_NAME)
     hoodieConfig.setDefaultValue(RECORDKEY_FIELD)
-    hoodieConfig.setDefaultValue(PARTITIONPATH_FIELD)
     hoodieConfig.setDefaultValue(KEYGENERATOR_CLASS_NAME)
     hoodieConfig.setDefaultValue(ENABLE)
     hoodieConfig.setDefaultValue(COMMIT_METADATA_KEYPREFIX)
diff --git a/hudi-spark-datasource/hudi-spark/src/test/scala/org/apache/hudi/TestHoodieSparkSqlWriter.scala b/hudi-spark-datasource/hudi-spark/src/test/scala/org/apache/hudi/TestHoodieSparkSqlWriter.scala
index 48f8408f674f9..fa248e46bd721 100644
--- a/hudi-spark-datasource/hudi-spark/src/test/scala/org/apache/hudi/TestHoodieSparkSqlWriter.scala
+++ b/hudi-spark-datasource/hudi-spark/src/test/scala/org/apache/hudi/TestHoodieSparkSqlWriter.scala
@@ -25,8 +25,9 @@ import org.apache.hudi.common.config.HoodieConfig
 import org.apache.hudi.common.model._
 import org.apache.hudi.common.table.{HoodieTableConfig, HoodieTableMetaClient, TableSchemaResolver}
 import org.apache.hudi.common.testutils.HoodieTestDataGenerator
+import org.apache.hudi.common.util.PartitionPathEncodeUtils
 import org.apache.hudi.config.{HoodieBootstrapConfig, HoodieWriteConfig}
-import org.apache.hudi.exception.HoodieException
+import org.apache.hudi.exception.{ExceptionUtil, HoodieException}
 import org.apache.hudi.execution.bulkinsert.BulkInsertSortMode
 import org.apache.hudi.functional.TestBootstrap
 import org.apache.hudi.hive.HiveSyncConfig
@@ -40,13 +41,16 @@ import org.apache.spark.sql.hudi.command.SqlKeyGenerator
 import org.apache.spark.sql.internal.{SQLConf, StaticSQLConf}
 import org.apache.spark.sql.{DataFrame, Dataset, Row, SQLContext, SaveMode, SparkSession}
 import org.junit.jupiter.api.Assertions.{assertEquals, assertFalse, assertTrue, fail}
+import org.junit.jupiter.api.function.Executable
 import org.junit.jupiter.api.{AfterEach, BeforeEach, Test}
 import org.junit.jupiter.params.ParameterizedTest
 import org.junit.jupiter.params.provider.{CsvSource, EnumSource, ValueSource}
 import org.mockito.ArgumentMatchers.any
 import org.mockito.Mockito.{spy, times, verify}
+import org.scalatest.Assertions.assertThrows
 import org.scalatest.Matchers.{assertResult, be, convertToAnyShouldWrapper, intercept}
 
+import java.io.IOException
 import java.time.Instant
 import java.util.{Collections, Date, UUID}
 import scala.collection.JavaConversions._
@@ -346,7 +350,6 @@ class TestHoodieSparkSqlWriter {
   @Test
   def testInsertDatasetWithoutPrecombineField(): Unit = {
 
-    //create a new table
     val fooTableModifier = commonTableModifier.updated(DataSourceWriteOptions.OPERATION.key, DataSourceWriteOptions.INSERT_OPERATION_OPT_VAL)
       .updated(DataSourceWriteOptions.INSERT_DROP_DUPS.key, "false")
 
@@ -375,6 +378,28 @@ class TestHoodieSparkSqlWriter {
     assert(df.except(trimmedDf).count() == 0)
   }
 
+  /**
+   * Test case for insert dataset without partitioning field
+   */
+  @Test
+  def testInsertDatasetWithoutPartitionField(): Unit = {
+    val tableOpts =
+      commonTableModifier
+        .updated(DataSourceWriteOptions.OPERATION.key, DataSourceWriteOptions.INSERT_OPERATION_OPT_VAL)
+
+    // generate the inserts
+    val schema = DataSourceTestUtils.getStructTypeExampleSchema
+    val structType = AvroConversionUtils.convertAvroSchemaToStructType(schema)
+    val records = DataSourceTestUtils.generateRandomRows(1)
+    val recordsSeq = convertRowListToSeq(records)
+    val df = spark.createDataFrame(sc.parallelize(recordsSeq), structType)
+
+    // try write to Hudi
+    assertThrows[IOException] {
+      HoodieSparkSqlWriter.write(sqlContext, SaveMode.Append, tableOpts - DataSourceWriteOptions.PARTITIONPATH_FIELD.key, df)
+    }
+  }
+
   /**
    * Test case for bulk insert dataset with datasource impl multiple rounds.
    */