Growth of GaN epitaxial layers is optimized in an indigenously developed nitride metal organic vapour phase epitaxy (MOVPE) system. The motivation of present work is to develop a simple MOVPE reactor which is though affordable but can deliver GaN epilayers of desired quality. The design and fabrication methodology of nitride MOVPE system is briefly discussed. MOVPE growth of GaN epilayers is carried out through a two-step growth process where influence of the growth parameters of low temperature buffer layer on the crystalline properties of high temperature GaN epilayer is discussed in detail. Optimum values of the growthtemperature, annealing duration and thickness of GaN buffer layer are achieved. High resolution X-ray diffraction measurements (HRXRD) confirmed that the crystalline quality of GaN epitaxial layers is reasonable. A good surface morphology of the optimized sample is strongly corroborated by the results obtained from photoluminescence (PL) and HRXRD techniques. Usefulness of a systematic Williamson-Hall analysis in the optimization of growth of GaN epitaxial layers is demonstrated where a high value of lateral coherence length ofGaN buffer layer is found to be a key parameter. Such an optimization process leads to the good crystalline quality of GaN epitaxial layers with low dislocation density. It is found that the high temperature GaN epilayers grown on the optimized GaN buffer layer are compressively stressed which is also revealed by the PL measurements