@AirAsia flight #I51426 delayed held hostage at BLR airport by a group of seemingly high profile passengers after m… https://t.co/t3EiPZaQgz — Amit Agarwal (@_Amit_Agarwal) 1569840682000

BENGALURU: A heated argument between a group of eight passengers claiming to be the relatives of a Rajasthan minister on an AirAsia Bengaluru-Pune flight and a cabin crew member delayed its departure by an hour on Monday afternoon. The flight took off only after passengers in the incident were forced to deplane.After other passengers filmed the incident, which involved pushing around and verbal threats, cabin crew made them delete the videos from their phones."AirAsia India confirms that a group of passengers travelling onboard I5-1426, operating between Bengaluru and Jaipur, were offloaded during onboarding for mistreating our cabin crew. AirAsia India reiterates that we place the safety and security of our passengers, staff and aircraft above all," an AirAsia India spokesperson said. According to sources, the clash broke out after the group of passengers sought a change of seat. When one of them misbehaved with a crew member, the group was asked to deboard.Rohit M, a passenger on the flight, told TOI that at one point, one of the unruly passengers threatened a crew member with physical assault. "There was a lot of pushing and threats. We're really proud of the crew member for staying calm and standing up to the threats. She did nothing wrong in asking people misbehaving with her to leave the plane," said Rohit.The flight, supposed to depart from Kempegowda International Airport here at 1.05pm, took off only at 2.41pm due to the incident. The flight landed in Pune around 4pm, more than 1 hour 30 minutes after its scheduled arrival time. After Pune, the flight departed to Jaipur where it landed around 6.12pm, while the original arrival time was 5 pm."@AirAsia flight #I51426 delayed held hostage at BLR Airport by a group of seemingly high profile passengers after misbehaving with cabin crew. No re4spect for the rest of 100s time. Put the crooks on NATIONAL NO FLY LIST!" tweeted Amit Agarwal, a passenger on board the flight.