a = [[1, 2], [3, 4], [5, 6], [7, 8]]
Each item in the list is again a list. You need to traverse and incerement each of it individually. So, nested for loop can solve your problem.
A more generic solution - Recursion
### Using recursion - The level of nesting doesn't matter
def incrementor(arr):
for i in range(len(arr)):
if type(arr[i]) is list:
incrementor(arr[i])
else:
arr[i] = arr[i] + 1
a = [[1, 2], [3, 4], [5, 6], [7, 8],9,10,11,12,[13,[14,15,16]],[[17,18],[19,[20,21]]]]
incrementor(a)
print(a)
Output
[[2, 3], [4, 5], [6, 7], [8, 9], 10, 11, 12, 13, [14, [15, 16, 17]], [[18, 19], [20, [21, 22]]]]