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Gene effects were studied for 12 characters in three crosses of <i>Gossypium hirsutum</i> by six generation mean model to determine the potential for improvement of yield components and fiber quality in upland cotton. Additive genetic variance (gene action) was predominantly operating in the inheritance of boll weight, single plant yield, and lint index. In the presence of epistasis dominance and additive × additive gene effects were observed for boll weight, single plant yield, lint index, ginning outturn, 2.5 percent span length, bundle strength fineness and uniformity ratio. Boll weight, lint index, seed index, ginning outturn, fineness, bundle strength and uniformity ratio were predominantly under the control of dominance and dominance × dominance gene action. Duplicate type epistasis was noticed for all the studied characters and the possible breeding strategies for improvement of lint yield and quality traits were discussed.