Now, sweet tweets for Swiss couple

U.P. police come up with a booklet of messages for the battered tourists

Getting social: U.P. DGP Sulkhan Singh, centre, with the ‘Get well soon’ booklet in Lucknow on Friday.

The tour of Fatehpur Sikri did not go as per plan for Quentin Jeremy Clerc and his partner Marie Droz. But the Uttar Pradesh police hope to mitigate some of the bitterness by gifting them a compilation of sympathetic messages from social media.

Director-General of Police Sulkhan Singh on Friday released the 80-page booklet as a farewell gesture.

Mr. Clerc and Ms. Droz had been attacked by some youths near a rail track at Fatehpur Sikri in Agra on October 22. The Swiss couple were first stalked and harassed before being brutally assaulted with stones and sticks. While Mr. Clerc suffered a fractured skull, Ms. Droz got a broken arm and many bruises. The incident triggered widespread outrage.

After facing heavy criticism, the police invited people to send “get well soon” tweets to the couple with the hashtag GWSMarieandJeremy.

Police spokesperson Rahul Srivastava said the police received 600-700 tweets in response. “We chose the better ones for the booklet,” he said. The tweets comprised get-well-soon messages, apologies, criticism of the system, and invitations to homes during their next visit.

Among the tweets in the booklet, one read: “You both are God for us. Atithi Devo Bhav[a].” Another said: “Our country has great warmth and a few lumpen elements should not give a false image (sic).”

“This shameful incident awaked our system…” said another.

The police had planned to hand over the booklet to the couple. But they could not do so as they had already left for Switzerland.

Mr. Srivastava told The Hindu that the Ministry of External Affairs assured him that a copy would be sent to them.

A copy would also be gifted to External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj.

Senior Superintendent of Police, Agra, Amit Pathak and Mr. Srivastava gifted copies of the booklet to Tamara Mona, Deputy Head of Mission, Swiss Embassy, and MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar in Delhi.