An Indigenous Australian television host has said she was racially profiled by police outside an Alice Springs bottle shop while she was in town to shoot a documentary.

Karla Grant, the host of the SBS program Living Black, said she was buying a bottle of wine and some beer when she was confronted by police.

“We walked into this BWS and there was a police officer, a female police officer, right at the entrance,” Grant said.

“She focused in on me and said, ‘Have you got any ID? Where are you staying?’

“I was so shocked and she didn’t ask for my producer’s ID. She just asked me … she really focused in on me.”

The incident happened two weeks ago while she was filming a documentary about a women’s choir from Vanuatu.

She said the police officer had implied she was a “grog runner”.

“My producer was fuming. He was like, ‘Oh my God, this is so racist,’” Grant said.

“It’s totally racist,” she added. “I think the town has got better in terms of racism but it’s still there. It’s underlying.”

Under what have been called the toughest alcohol laws in the country, police in the Northern Territory patrol bottle shops to detect whether customers may be buying alcohol to sell or drink in remote communities and town camps.

“This is a very complex situation and it’s not my place to comment on the Northern Territory government’s alcohol policies and measures,” she told Guardian Australia.

“My concern is the policing approach and the way I was harassed, which I take issue with,” she said.

The NT’s laws, which are aimed at reducing alcohol-fuelled violence, prohibit the consumption of alcohol in more than 100 areas. However, critics have described the laws as racist and say they lead to the unfair targeting of Indigenous people.

The NT’s Labor government has repealed two of the most controversial laws: alcohol prevention orders and alcohol mandatory treatment orders.

A NT police statement said the force was “not aware” of any complaints about the incident.

“Concerns around the enforcement of legislation at point of sale interventions are raised from time to time,” a spokesman told the ABC.

“These concerns are investigated thoroughly with feedback provided to those who raise the concerns.”

Grant told Guardian Australia she did not intend to lodge a complaint with the police.