Invest or repay?

Invest or repay? This is a question that never has an off-season. Here's a typical example. A reader emailed me saying that he has a housing loan on which he is paying interest at the rate of 11 per cent per year. There's no problem--he's able to pay the EMI comfortably out of his income. However, he now finds that he also has some cash accumulated which he can invest. He would like to know which is the better option: should he repay some of his housing loan before schedule, or should he invest in an equity mutual fund for the long-term? This is not an uncommon dilemma. In fact, it's possible that practically every salary earner who t