threatens the preservation of the country's age-old social
  order.

Now my question is this: Do we have evidence that British colonial politics opposite Indian maharajas was indeed shaped by such dynamics and whether colonial decision makers subscribed to similar ideas towards the beginning and end of British rule in India? (For instance, I am aware that Douglas MacArthur supported a continued role for the Japanese Tenno after World War II for partly similar reasons, but I was not aware so far that the Maharajas continued-if-somewhat-diminished influence e.g. in the 19th century should be mainly attributed to anything else but their families' political maneuverings in what from their perspective must have appeared as a struggle for survival.)

A:

Bankers, businessmen, landowners, nobles and princes all gave active support to the British.Indigenous collaborators and "traitors" such as Mir Jafar were key elements the British exploited to their own advantage. They promoted and demoted officials and bureaucrats to suit their ends. These are well recorded- the active support by the Jagat Seths and other bankers, the various nobility and princes.
The history of this period is now seen as a mercantile expansion- and the role of money, the motivation for acquiring wealth are seen as important factors. So the social milieu, complex economics, dynamics of a center-periphery competition and the transition from agrarian to mercantile economy are seen as contributing much more to the equation- it is no longer viewed as a simple 'military expansion' history.
Colonial history is therefore not a simplistic ruler-subject equation. Rather the British are seen as active