The present paper reports the dislocation unpinning model of acoustic emission (AE) from alkali halide crystals. Equations are derived for the strain dependence of the transient AE pulse rate, peak value of the AE pulse rate and the total number of AE pulse emitted. It is found that the AE pulse rate should be maximum for a particular strain of the crystals. The peak value of the AE pulse rate should depend on the volume and strain rate of the crystals, and also on the pinning time of dislocations. Since the pinning time of dislocations decreases with increasing strain rate, the AE pulse rate should be weakly dependent on the strain rate of the crystals. The total number of AE should increase linearly with deformation and then it should attain a saturation value for the large deformation. By measuring the strain dependence of the AE pulse rate at a fixed strain rate, the time constantτ_s for surface annihilation of dislocations and the pinning timeτ_p of the dislocations can be determined. A good agreement is found between the theoretical and experimental results related to the AE from alkali halide crystals.