Sushmita Banerjee, Indian woman whose book was made into Bollywood film, dragged from her home and shot by Taliban

An Indian author famous for her dramatic account of escaping Taliban-ruled Afghanistan nearly two decades ago, and who later returned to the country, has been shot dead by the hardline group after being dragged from her home.

It was the latest in a string of attacks and intimidation campaigns against prominent women. One senator lost a daughter in a recent ambush, and a popular MP remains missing weeks after she was kidnapped on a main highway.

The author Sushmita Banerjee, who married an Afghan and lived for years in a remote rural area, became a celebrity in India when her story was made into the Bollywood film Escape from Taliban.

She chose to move back to Afghanistan several years ago and was living with her husband, Janbaz Khan, in his family home just outside the main town in Paktika province, near the border with Pakistan, where she did healthcare work.

The Taliban apparently tracked her down to her old home and burst into the compound in the middle of the night. They dragged the 45 year-old away and left the rest of the family unhurt.

"Last night around 1.30am the Taliban came to their house, broke down the door and took her alone to a different area called al-Jihad, where there is a madrassa," Daulat Khan Zadran, the provincial police chief in Paktika, told the Guardian. "After that they opened fire on her, there were 15 bullets in her body."

Zadran said locals knew that Banerjee had "made a movie about the Taliban and Afghan culture", but he said there was no clear motive for the attack. The BBC said a Taliban official had denied any responsibility for the attack – spokesmen for the hardline Islamist movement frequently disown operations. In Afghanistan violence often stems from tribal, family or other disagreements or may be conducted by semi-autonomous groups acting without orders from senior insurgent commanders.

However there were plenty of reasons for the Taliban to target Banerjee. In an article in the Indian magazine Outlook the writer, who had converted to Islam, described how villagers she lived with were "terrorised" by the movement.

Some analysts have linked a series of attacks on Indian targets in Afghanistan to regional rivalry in south Asia in which India and Pakistan fight for influence in the country. The imminent withdrawal of international troops from Afghanistan has given the contest a new edge, they say.

Benerjee's book, A Kabuliwala's Bengali Wife, detailed the harsh lifestyle of women in rural Afghanistan that she had been expected to embrace when she moved there with her husband in 1989. The Taliban swept to power some time after he returned to India to work, and she decided to escape a life that had gone from difficult to unendurable when soldiers closed her small pharmacy.

"The members of the Taliban who called on us were aghast that I, a woman, could be running a business establishment. They ordered me to close down the dispensary and branded me a woman of poor morals," she wrote years later.

"They also listed out dos and don'ts. The burkha was a necessity. Listening to the radio or playing a tape recorder was banned. Women were not allowed to go to shops. They were even prohibited from stepping out from their houses unless accompanied by their husbands."

Extreme even by the standards of the radical group, the local commanders also forced women in her area to get a tattoo of their husband's name on their left hand.

Her first escape attempt was foiled by her own brothers-in-law, who were enraged that she had brought shame on their home by trying to flee. During the second attempt she was caught by Taliban soldiers and nearly executed, but persuaded them that as an Indian she had a right to leave the country.

Despite that harrowing experience, she chose to move back to Afghanistan with her husband, apparently believing that she had put the Taliban years behind her.

Mokhtar Amiri contributed reporting