A British prisoner who claims to be a practicing Jedi says he faces persecution from authorities unwilling to recognise the Star Wars religion.

The unnamed prisoner has written to prison newspaper Inside Time, asking editors not to publish his name or other details "as I fear retaliation from the dark side". In a letter published on the newspaper's website, he writes: "I recently put in an application asking that I be allowed to practise my religion freely – I am a Jedi. The written reply said, '…whilst Jedi is a recognised religion according to the UK census, it is not recognised by the National Offender Management Service, and we cannot change your religious record because of this.'"

The letter writer, according to Inside Time, is from HMP Isis, a category C institution for male young offenders in south-east London.

The prisoner claims his alleged mistreatment is an example of the kind of intolerance and religious bigotry faced by Jedi on a daily basis, both within the prison system and in the public. "Jedis have been portrayed very negatively in the media ever since the tragic battle of Yavin IV, when Luke Skywalker and a group of left-wing militants targeted the Death Star in a terrorist attack, killing thousands of civilian personnel," he writes. "Please withhold my name in the paper as I fear retaliation from the dark side. May the force be with you."

Inside Time is a newspaper for prisoners and detainees, published monthly and distributed throughout the UK prison system.

A total of 176,632 people listed themselves as Jedi in the 2011 UK census, placing the religion just behind Judaism and Buddhism as the seventh-most-popular British religion.