def _handle_unicode_for_input_str(self, input_str):
"""
This method returns the encoded|original string based on the Python version.
:param input_str: Input string to be processed
:return: encoded input_str
"""
try:
if input_str:
input_str = UnicodeDammit(input_str).unicode_markup.encode(
'utf-8')
input_str = input_str.decode('utf-8')
except:
self.debug_print("Error occurred while encoding input string")
return input_str
