State-owned Allahabad Bank today reported a 44.5 per cent decline in its net profit at Rs 310.83 crore for the third quarter ended December 2012 as the amount of bad loans of the bank rose significantly.

Its net profit over the same period a year earlier stood at Rs 560.43 crore.

Bank's total income during October-December quarter of 2012-13 increased to Rs 4,785.34 crore from Rs 4,260.28 crore in the year ago period, it said in a filing to the BSE.

The net non-performing assets (NPA) or bad loans of the public sector lender increased to 2.06 per cent for the December quarter from 0.79 per cent of the same period in the previous fiscal.

In value terms, the net NPA rose to Rs 2,477.50 crore during the quarter from Rs 795.97 crore a year earlier.

Deposits of the bank increased to Rs 1.70 lakh crore as on December 31, 2012 from Rs 1.45 lakh crore a year ago, an increase of 17.45 per cent, it said.

The bank said it had planned to open 250 branches during 2012-13 of which 148 branches have already been opened in the first nine months to December while authorisation for opening 140 new branches are in hand.

Shares of the bank traded at Rs 164.20 apiece in noon trades on the BSE, down 1.74 per cent from the previous close.