[quote="Captain Cupcake"]I believe it was stated somewhere that it was an error made in the remastering process for the blu-ray. They didn't purposely remove it.[/quote]
I do know the copy used on the Blu-Ray/DVD edition was transferred from the copy for the theatrical 3D release, and the computer imagery was done on files from the CAPS program which are outdated by today's standards so I'm sure the Blu-Ray team tried to restore them as much as possible. Nevertheless, I am trying to find a reliable source to explain this, and I found this
source,
an interview with the stereoscopic supervisor Robert Neuman and
another one, and a roundtable interview with Don Hahn, Roger Allers, and Rob Minkoff:
[quote="
Blu-Ray"]
Were you ever tempted to pull a "George Lucas" and "improve" parts of The Lion King prior to this new release? Roger Allers: No, I think we knew to leave well enough alone. I did some color correcting, though, on a few scenes that I was never happy with.[/quote]