diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 108c47fa..b9021506 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -11,6 +11,7 @@ and this project adheres to [Semantic Versioning](https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0
 ### Changed
 
 ### Fixed
+* Fixed an over-decref of the borrowed module dictionary reference on the module initialization error path [gh-264](https://github.com/IntelPython/mkl_umath/pull/264)
 
 ## [0.5.0] - 2026-08-06
 
diff --git a/mkl_umath/src/ufuncsmodule.c b/mkl_umath/src/ufuncsmodule.c
index 50dd7790..5863081d 100644
--- a/mkl_umath/src/ufuncsmodule.c
+++ b/mkl_umath/src/ufuncsmodule.c
@@ -54,7 +54,7 @@ PyMODINIT_FUNC PyInit__ufuncs(void)
     import_umath();
 
     if (InitOperators(d) < 0) {
-        Py_XDECREF(d);
+        /* d is a borrowed reference from PyModule_GetDict; do not decref it. */
         Py_XDECREF(m);
         return NULL;
     }