An IndiGo flight from Goa to Hyderabad took off on Monday night without 14 passengers, all of who were already given boarding passes, The Times of India reported.

While the passengers alleged the flight took off earlier than scheduled and no announcements about the change were made, IndiGo said the airline staff looked for them at the airport and made “frantic announcements over the hand-held loudspeaker”.

The flight was scheduled for a 10.50 pm take-off but left 25 minutes earlier, the passengers told The Times of India. They said they had boarding passes and were waiting to board the flight, and did not know when it took off.

The airline, however, denied the allegations and said, “The boarding gate closed at 10.25 pm and they reached the gate at 10.33 pm.” An unidentified IndiGo spokesperson also said the airline tried reaching the passengers on a mobile phone number, but it was that of their travel agent, who promised to pass on the message.

The spokesperson said after the 14 passengers did not turn up, they were declared “gate no-show”, and the flight took off. “Despite no fault on our part, we shifted them to the next morning flight free of charge,” the spokesperson told The Times of India.

The airline said it had offloaded the check-in bags of the 14 passengers.