The Oxford professor at the centre of the Ethics of Empire row has said young academics are afraid of damaging their careers if they are seen with him.

Nigel Biggar said a colleague even told him he would only come to an event he was organising if he could be assured his picture would not be taken.

The Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology said it was “appalling” that there was an atmosphere at universities preventing academics from openly expressing their views.

Prof Beggar’s comments come after he was branded a “bigot” by students and attacked by colleagues for an article last November in which described this history of the British Empire as “morally mixed”.

Following the article, over 50 Oxford professors, lecturers and researchers signed an open letter expressing their “firm rejection” of his views.

Speaking about the backlash at the Cheltenham Literary Festival on Sunday, Prof Biggar said during the row only one colleague dared to defended him publicly, while many privately emailed him expressing support.

However he said the “most disturbing” reaction he encountered came from a junior academic he invited to a private conference he had organised to discuss a paper on the British Empire.