In href, ~ is not working when binding from code behind - asp.net

Question

When binding href tag from code behind it's not working. This is my aspx code. When I am directly putting <a> tag on aspx it's working whereas as soon as I doing it through Response.write it's reading ~ as such not as a root directory.
<% Response.Write("<a id=\"A1\" runat=\"server\" class=\"menuItem\" href=\"~/HR/Emp/EmpDetails.aspx?mid=167\">My PIPs</a> "); %>
<a id="A1" runat="server" class="menuItem" href="~/HR/Emp/EmpDetails.aspx?mid=167">My PIPs</a>
binding through literal also it's not working
Literal.text = "<a id=\"A1\" runat=\"server\" class=\"menuItem\" href=\"~/HR/Emp/EmpDetails.aspx?mid=167\">My PIPs</a> ";
Please help on this.
these are the HTML tags
<ul id="jMenu">
<li>
<a runat="server" class="fNiv" href="~\Default.aspx?mid=1&">Home</a>
</li>
<li>
<a runat="server" class="fNiv" href="">Human Resources</a>
<ul>
<li class="arrow" />
<li>
<a runat="server" class="menuItem" href="~\HR\EMP\PIPWorkFlow.aspx?mid=166">Performance Improvement Plan (PIP)</a>
<ul>
<li>
<a runat="server" class="menuItem" href="~\HR\EMP\PIPWorkFlow.aspx?mid=171">Data Protection Statement</a>
</li>
<li>
<a runat="server" class="menuItem" href="~\HR\EMP\EmpPIPDetails.aspx?mid=167">My PIPs</a>
</li>
<li>
<a runat="server" class="menuItem" href="~\HR\EMP\PIPHome.aspx?mid=168">Team PIPs</a>
</li>
<li>
<a runat="server" class="menuItem" href="~\HR\EMP\HRPIPHistory.aspx?mid=169">Employee PIPs</a>
</li>
<li>
<a runat="server" class="menuItem" href="~\HR\EMP\AppraisalRatingUpload.aspx?mid=170">Upload Appraisal Ratings</a>
</li>
<li>
<a runat="server" class="menuItem" href="~\HR\EMP\PIPRoleAssignment.aspx?mid=472">PIP Spoc Role Assignment</a>
</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>
<a runat="server" class="fNiv" href="~\ContactUs.aspx?mid=39">Contact Us</a>
</li>
</ul>
these are the html tags... if we are binding these tags with Literal or div or TD ... they are reading ~ sign as such...
if I am putting these tags directly in HTML its working perfectly fine

Answer 1

Response.Write and Literal.Text output whatever you give them with no processing.
This means whatever you give these methods/property will be output verbatim. No URL resolution will occur and the runat=server attribute is meaningless.
You can use the Control.ResolveClientUrl() method to generate the link yourself, or manipulate the link as a server control in the codebehind.
Option 1
// this line is fine
string url = ResolveClientUrl("~/some-url/foo.aspx");
// this line is quite ugly, but should work
var lit = new Literal { Text = "<a href='" + url + "'>a link</a>" };
// add it the page/control's control hierarchy
this.Controls.Add( lit );
Option 2
// instantiate the control dynamically
// URL resolution is done automatically
var lnk = new HtmlAnchor { HRef = "~/some-url/foo.aspx" };
// add it the page/control's control hierarchy
this.Controls.Add( lnk );
Option 3
Let's say that you must deal with a string, not the control hierarchy (as per the comments). This is not ideal, but it is possible if the URLs in the string are relative to the application root.
// resolve the application root
string root = ResolveClientUrl("~/");
// string of raw HTML
string html = "My PIPs";
// replace the urls with a resolved version
// this is very simplistic...a proper parser would be more reliable
html = html.Replace( "~/", root + "/" );
// output as desired
Response.Write( html );